Chief commissioner Erwin Hermanson says the Canadian Grain
Commission is considering changes to relax wheat-grading standards.
It’s an explosive issue stretching back decades.
Canadian Prairie-grown hard red spring wheat has a
reputation as the best for making fluffy loaves of white bread, mainly because
of the strength of the gluten.
That reputation has been closely guarded by restricting the
licencing of varieties that can be grown on the Prairies.
They are identified by the colour of the kernels;
lower-protein wheats are not allowed.
But farmers in the United States have been growing
higher-yielding varieties with lower protein levels and have been encroaching
on Canadian export markets. Some of these U.S.-allowed varieties are hard to distinguish, simply by looking at the kernels, from top-quality Canadian wheat.
The markets for bread wheat have also been changing in the
direction of less need for the high-protein Canadian varieties.
The popularity of gluten-free products has also cut into the
demand for Canadian high-protein hard red spring wheats.
Hermanson talked with a reporter for the Manitoba
Co-operator after speaking to the annual meeting of the Manitoba Seed Growers
Association and said “The gluten-strength issue, there’s these American
varieties (Faller and Prosper) being grown legally.
“There’s a market for them, why doesn’t our class system
embrace them?
“Those are good questions. We don’t have all the
answers.
“We want to consult and ask the right questions and get
the right answers and make the right decisions.”
Frankly, until there is a reliable way to tell the high-protein varieties from the "feed wheats," I think the Canadian standards ought to remain in place.
Ontario does it by keeping careful track of all the wheat produced by these different varieties. The contract system appears to be working well.
